Paintbrushes
by cherryvvoid
Summary: If there was anything she could never have predicted, it was this. SI-as-half-Uchiha-fem!Sai. AU. Danzo is a main character despite not being listed!
1. Within The Roots of a Tree

**Disclaimer****: I don't own Naruto.**

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><p>Blinking her black eyes the small child forced herself to hold absolutely still as she stood in a row with the other children next to her shoulders.<p>

At the (assumed) age of three the young girl named "Sai" knew exactly where and who she was and it had - still - terrified her.

But not enough to resist.

Not enough to try for escape, fear made her cautious not foolish.

She liked to think she had gotten used to it by some degree, if anything she could compare how she felt to Stockholm syndrome.

The robed figure of Shimura Danzo seemed like a beacon shining out of the corner of her eyes but she didn't glance over and kept her attention focused squarely on the battle between the two young kids - knowing ones age was nearly a myth down here - taking place in the arena.

The sounds of flesh hitting flesh and near silent grunts of pain filtered into one ear and out the other. She had learned a long time ago how to tune out the more...scarring noises seeing as how Sai would never get any sleep otherwise. The months of insomnia spoke volumes.

Hearing the telling sound of a body hitting the ground she blinked and saw the blonde haired girl attempting to push herself up into a passable fighting guard and she almost made it but a calm voice cut through the panting in the room and drew everyone's attention like a moth to a flame. They all turned in unison.

"Enough." Danzo drawled, his dark eye watching the two children dispassionately. "Jin, exit the ring, Sai enter."

Nodding once she uttered a single 'yes Danzo-sama' before she moved into the circle. Her body was bruised, the marks from her battles as clear as day on her pale skin but she shrugged through the trembling of her muscles and slide into her stance.

The boy who had beat Jin was quick she would give him that. He was quick and hit heavy.

She barely heard the Hajime declaring the match before she was moving forward.

He was fast but she _understood_ and Sai didn't have the time or the energy to waste.

_And with her first strike she had already won._

It might not have taken him down with the first hit - the hours spent fighting weighed her down, not to mention her sparring for was laughable - but from the moment she approached him she had been - thankfully - controlling the fight.

Standing above the downed child Sai turned around and kneeled. She had made it as painless and as quick as she could. She had already learned the lesson of what happened with she refused to finish a fight.

"Very good." Danzo said but she didn't allow herself to relax, there was always a catch to everything this man said. "Kikuchi, enter, Gou exit."

Sai felt herself begin to tense - she had learned to expect such things - but she forced herself to relax. Sai knew why Danzo kept pitting her against this boy and she knew why this boy made it his life's mission to win in every fight against her.

One received a lot of animosity within the "unemotional" ranks of ROOT when viewed as the favorite of Danzo and never mind that fact that it wasn't so much as favoritism but the desire to have his blood kin stronger than the rest.

After all, Danzo-ojii-sama didn't take failure lightly but try as she might, dodge as quick as she could, hit as hard as she dared, Sai wasn't good enough to evade the strike that sent her tumbling to her knees and into unconsciousness.

She was out before she could even catch sight of the ground.

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><p><strong>This will obviously be an AU as you can see by how Sai is related to Danzo. That will be explained in later chapters when who Sai's other family is *I'm making Sai an Uchiha so you might figure it out quick*. <strong>

**There will be changes to the time line based on the fact that Sai is Danzo's grandchild. Please be respectful of my creative license ^^. But other than that this is the prologue. The next chapter will be longer of course. Also. I'm taking the Sai SI and Deidara SI down and I'm going to redo the poll and I need people to vote because the other ones are tied. Please review.**

**Also if any of you were curious as to why Sai doesn't know her age I'm pretty sure that's not even discussed down there nor are birthdays celebrated.**

**I'll edit this later.**


	2. Meetings

Sai found it most ironic that she - a former art student - managed to land herself a spot in the single most artistic body in all the elemental nations.

She also found it a strange turn that she was put into such an unemotional position considering it was her job to put said emotions onto a canvas and as a human being it was her job to feel.

Everyone in ROOT - as per the conditioning - was indifferent to human affection and the interaction with her was little to none outside of her sparring partners and Danzo. This was probably how her grandfather preferred it to be honest.

In the middle of dragging her pencil down the blank paper of her sketch book that her grandfather allowed her to have Sai was at least glad she had the consent to keep this small luxury. She could tell that going behind his back wouldn't have been a good decision to make.

Danzo for weeks now had been training Sai in perfecting her recollective skills ever since he saw the miasma of drawings she kept in her scrolls.

He'd taken one considering look at her art before he seemingly came to a decision. One she could tell was equally to keep content and to provide his soldier with a new skill set.

"It seems you've taken after your mother in more ways than one." He said and despite her lessons Sai could feel surprise jump onto her face at the mention and knew there'd be remedial training for that slip up. "I will teach you just as I did Kiryu."

It hadn't been much information but it was enough to know that her mother had some skill with a paintbrush. Sai liked to think that maybe Danzo was letting her draw because of some attachment to hi deceased daughter but _eh_, the man was an enigma.

So here Sai was attempting to sketch a perfect profile of a random villager her grandfather assigned to her. She had only gotten the main features down and was trying to drag the woman's visage back into the center of her mind.

Granted Sai would think she'd focus better if she weren't meeting the Hokage for the first time. She was a very stressed child when she thought about it.

"Hiruzen," Her grandfather introduced primly, one hand sweeping back to gesture at her form. "this is my granddaughter, Shimura Sai."

Slipping her drawing utensils back into her satchel Sai bowed formally.

"Hokage-sama." She said in her perfectly neutral - and respectful - voice, taking note of the facial expression the old man was broadcasting. He seemed awfully surprised but she was sure her grandfather must have mentioned her. Maybe she reminded him of someone?

"So," The peaceful - perhaps too peaceful - old man drawled from behind his folded hands. "this is Kiryu's daughter eh?"

Ah, so that's who then. Sai flashed him a placid, warm toned smile and was rewarded with the slight furrow of his brow.

"Yes, I can see where she inherited that from." The Hokage muttered after taking in the smile that was apparently signature to her mother. But Sai thought it was rather creditable to anyone in ROOT.

Leaning forward the Hokage smiled at her and Sai resisted the urge to shift away from how sincere it was but the faint underlying suspicion kept her in place. Ah, so despite being a child she was a child of Danzo and maybe that suspicion wasn't for her but it was nice to know he was still wary. Or rather where she stood on his scale.

Or maybe she was reading this all wrong and the look in his eyes was something else entirely, she was still a novice when it came to things of this variety so she couldn't take much of the blame.

So Sai smiled back, using the easy childish grin from when she wasn't who she was now and bowed once again.

"It was very nice to meet you Sai-san." Sarutobi said and she nodded in agreement. It was an interesting thing to meet the God of Shinobi.

"Likewise Hokage-sama."

And thus Sai was dismissed after some banal chatter between the two older men feeling as if that encounter had been lacking but happy to be out from under that oppressive atmosphere. Being immersed in her grandfather's aura was enough for her.

Danzo had stayed behind to have a meeting and Sai was more or less given the green light to get to know as much of the village as she could in person .

Well, given the green light to wander around with an "ANBU" guard at her tail.

She already knew all the landscape from the layouts her grandfather made her memorize but it wasn't the same as seeing them life size.

Ignoring her...guard Sai knew this was the beginning of her becoming more entangled with the public face of the village. Danzo wouldn't have introduced her to the Hokage if he didn't want her to interact with people, she could have followed behind the canon!Sai and not have came into the picture until Shippuden.

Not to mention her grandfather had already told her the parameters of letting her become inclusive within the Leaf. Soon she'd be at the Academy and from there she would keep her eyes on possible ROOT candidates, the Uchiha, and Jinchuuriki.

It was strange, Sai decided, to think of Naruto - the little blond boy from the anime she had watched - as simply the host to the demon fox but that's really all he was to her and nothing more. Now, she didn't think the word Jinchuuriki with disdain or hatred because it was just a simple fact. Like saying she was Danzo's granddaughter or that the Fire Country housed Konoha within its boarders.

It was nothing personal but then again, nothing in ROOT done by the agents ever really was.

Taking out her sketch book she resumed her profile of the woman and even was trying her hand at weaving through the crowds using only her senses to feel where everything was. No one could blame her for not using her time wisely.

Carefully filling in the woman's hair and shoulder lines Sai thought she was doing a pretty good job navigating the sea of people and was feeling pretty content with her progress.

That was until she rammed drawing pad first into the person in front of her.

Staring downward at the now marred sketch of the woman - it was unusable with that heavy pencil line cutting through her features - she could feel the disdain manifesting clear as day on her face despite her conditioning and that made her even more irritated.

Glaring upwards with a miniscule frown on her round face she met the black eyes of someone she knew well from the files inside of ROOT.

Uchiha Itachi was just as intimidating as she thought he would be and it was making her uncomfortable.

Sai dropped her expression and forced a fluid smile onto her face to hide the uneasiness. She didn't want to tangle with anything having to do with him just yet.

"Ah, sorry for running into you I wasn't paying much attention to where I was walking." She said apologetically, waiting for him to reply so that she could make her escape but he seemed content to just stare at her..._hair?_

Resisting the urge to reach up to smooth down her wily hair - it had grown out again and whenever it grows out it _curls_ - Sai cocked her head to the side.

"Uchiha-san?"

Knowing she had snapped him out whatever stupor he had been in but he didn't show it Itachi glanced down, opened his mouth and-

The small body ramming into his legs cut him off.

Internally cursing the circumstances Sai knew better than to walk away. She needed her relations with this clan to be pristine if she wanted to be able to keep an eye on it. ROOT didn't take kindly to failure and Sai found neither did she.

"I found you Itachi-nii!" A tiny male voice chirped and Sai blinked when she caught sight of the youngest Uchiha heir's adoring face. He was her physical age which was odd enough to realize when she could clearly see the differences in how they acted.

It made her feel awkward to see such blatant immaturity.

And honestly, meeting two Uchiha was enough for Sai, her mission to watch them hadn't began so she didn't have a reason to associate with them at the moment but nevertheless another one came out of the wood works in the form of one Uchiha Shisui.

Her first thought - surprisingly - was that she wasn't the only one whose hair suffered the curse of the curl.

Her second - unsurprisingly - was that she was going to get real tired, real quick of everyone pointing out how much she looked like an Uchiha.

She just knew it, especially if the slack jawed way the newest clan addition was staring at her was any indication. Not to mention she could clearly hear the spare Uchiha heir "whisper" ask his brother if she was of any relation to them.

Deciding it was in her best interest at this point to take the initiative and try to establish a pre-existing connection that she would take full advantage of later, Sai inclined her head and introduced herself.

"I'm sorry Uchiha-san but I am no one of such importance to you, I am Shimura Sai." She smiled sweetly. "How do you do?"

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><p><strong>So here's the next chapter! She met a lot of people here. And just why was Itachi staring at her hair? Shisui is speechless? Give me your thoughts?<strong>

**Also, over this break every story will be updated. Every. Single. One. Okay? Also. Anon is being monitored so all those asshole-ish anon reviews won't be published but they'll make me laugh. Tee hee!~ ❤❤**

**So review everyone, it gives me life!~**


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